Those who make magic see the future before anybody else: Uber CEO Travis Kalanick

Kalanick, who is obviously no stranger to the uniquely Indian phrase 'jugaad', or innovating on the fly, said the key to successful entrepreneurship is that very trait. "Always be jugaading," he said.Biswarup Gooptu | ET Bureau | January 17, 2016, 11:03 IST

Travis Kalanick, who has built the world’s most valuable startup, has a very distinctive view on what it takes to be an outstanding entrepreneur: such a person should be a crystal ball gazer and a philosopher rolled into one.

No, he did not mean it literally. According to the CEO of Uber, a great startup founder will be someone like a Steve Jobs, who could see the future before anyone else.

Kalanick made his point at the Startup India meet by whipping out his iPhone and saying Jobs visualised a product made in 2016 a decade before. "Those who make magic are the ones who are seeing the future way before anyone else does," he said.

And it's not just important to see the future, but see it clearly enough to distinguish what is real and what is not. That is where great founders are able to tell the "difference between perception and reality," Kalanick, 39, said.

Kalanick was being watched from the front row by Bhavish Aggarwal, the founder of his biggest India rival Ola, as well as Masayoshi Son and Nikesh Arora of SoftBank, the men who have backed Ola and Uber's China competitor Didi Kuaidi. Uber has promised to invest $1 billion in India as it expands to new cities and develops new products and payment solutions. But the company has also had to face numerous regulatory challenges.

Kalanick admitted that the challenges in India are unique, and pointed to payments as one. "There are a few areas that matter, and the way we deal with that is by empowering the local teams to win in their cities," he said. Uber, which is valued at about $62.5 billion, recently said its Chinese unit was valued at about $8 billion, after raising about $1.2 billion.

The Uber chief executive, who told the audience that he had spent four weeks on a beach in Thiruvananthapuram a decade ago coding for a small startup, said India is at an "inflection point" and from here on innovation from this country will go global.

Kalanick, who is obviously no stranger to the uniquely Indian phrase 'jugaad', or innovating on the fly, said the key to successful entrepreneurship is that very trait. "Always be jugaading," he said.